Man of connections

Still, at 71, Banks looks fit, hair and beard white andclose-cropped, eyes sharp behind a pair of frameless glasses thatsit like windows on his face. Wearing a blazer, carrying a galleyof his 12th novel, "Lost Memory of Skin",he chats in a general way with a reader, at that time stubs out his cigarette andmoves back inside, taking the escalator up to the hotelrestaurant.

"The trial," he recalls, "involved a guy accused by his 10-year-olddaughter and her friend of having exposed himself to them andfondled them. It was the first time I ever had to confront thisreality in a personal way. The guy was obviously guilty. Nevertheless he wasbasically a confused, stupid alcoholic, and it was so easy toimagine this poor stumblebum, in a cloud most of the time, in aworld that has been eroticized to such a degree, sitting there andhe's sexually inadequate with his wife, and he's a loser, he's outof work, he has no sense of any power in the world whatsoever, sothis beast in him starts to arise."

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